Love Killer
by JoyJoyful
Summary: Artemisia, a Forensic Anthropology who works at the Jeffersonian Institute with her two best friends, Angela Montenegro and Temperance Brennan. As she helps the team solve murders, will she find answers to her own questions along the way? As Happy goes on her journey to find answers will she also find answers to her own heart? SLOW-BURN, lol.
1. Chapter 1

The Skull in the Sculpture Pt1

Two older men climbed over the fence and into junkyard. One man wore glasses with a long sleeve shirt along with a gray sweater with denim jeans, the other had a beard and a little more meat than the other. He wore a plaid shirt along with a brown light jacket with denim jeans and they both had in hand a bottle of beer.

They walked around looking at cars for car parts that they could steal that would seem worthy to them. They walked and found a crushed car with an untouched golden side mirror. The beard man gently unscrewed the side golden mirror removing slowly from the car. And that's when the crushed car started to bleed like a person. He pulled at the glass screen and became face to face with a bleeding skull face. They dropped their beer bottles and ran for their lives.

Near by a bar, a woman quickly got out of the yellow taxi hugging herself as the cold wind flew by. "Hey Angie. Sweets." Artemisia pulled her friend into a hug stealing her drink away from her clinking the drink with Sweets as a greeting before drowning it down.

"Misty Baby!" Angela screamed in excitement waving her hand wildly to the bartender to order more drinks. Angela is a beautiful young woman who found out she was married right before she was gonna get married. She finally got divorced and broke up with her soon-to-be-husband thus the reason she's drinking.

"Okay just to be clear, I asked you out for a drink to talk, not because I'm desperate for male company." Angela informs Sweets in one of her moods since she broke up.

"You think of me as male company?" Sweets says surprised and feeling a little bit cocky at the same time. "Who wouldn't? Look at that cute butt you have there." Artemisia says making him jump a little when she grabs his butt. Angela and Artemisia burst out laughing and giggling when they see the uncomfortable expression Sweets has on his face.

"Vodka up, please. Two." Artemisia orders from the bartender as he comes asking for our orders. "And our grandson here will have another of whatever that it." Angela points at Sweets drink. He declines but quickly changes his mind for one more. "I'm cabbing it." He decides.

"You just got divorced and broke up with your fiancé. It's totally understandable that you don't feel like sex." Sweets gets right into his psychologist mode. Angela ignores him and watches the crowd for a potential pray for the night.

"Oh, she feels like sex, alright." Artemisia watches amused. "Sex is what I feel like. Now I could jump Hodgins, but that doesn't seem fair somehow, don't you agree?"

"Well, what matter is that it doesn't seem fair to you." Sweets points out to Angela the truth. Artemisia cringles. "I hate it when shrinks do that." Artemisia couldn't agree more with Angela on that even watching him shrink her.

"Look, I've been alone now for quite a while, which is not like me." Angela explains trying to figure out the reason why.

"Yeah, well, when we open ourselves emotionally and get hurt we're reluctant to allow ourselves to be that vulnerable again." Even what Sweets said made her cringle.

Artemisia zones out ignoring their conversation, she was there to have a good time and ignore everything else in the world. Forget everything, just groove with life. She eyes a man whose had an eye on her since the second she's come through the door. She throws him a seductive smirk not approaching him. Artemisia never approach men, they must approach her first or they won't get a taste. No matter how strong she makes herself seems like, she's super insecure about everything but the facts when she's at work. That's the only thing in life that she would ever be sure about.

"To sex!" Angela cheers with Sweets and the entire bar seem to hear her and yells along with her. They spent the night drinking away their problems until Angela was too drunk to even walk. Artemisia sent her home in a cab, "You coming to my place?" Sweets ask as Artemisia closed the door to the yellow cab watching it disappear in the night. "Why not?" Art said hooking he arms together with Sweets and waving for a taxi.

Artemisia walks into her office with sunglasses on and her second cup of coffee in hand. "I am never drinking again." She said to herself knowing that, that wasn't the truth. "We have a body to examine." One of the intern's pop into her room to let her know.

"Looks like someone with a crooked nose was trying to get rid of our friend here." Artemisia half-yawned when Dr. Saroyan glared at the unprofessional behavior over a dead body. Artemisia responded with a sheepishly smile. "There's no way to know that the killer had a crooked nose." Brennan said confused at Artemisia's comment.

"You mean, the mob? It was a mob hit." Daisy, a new intern said in disbelief with a hint of fakeness in her tone.

"He clearly wasn't wearing a belt." Dr. Saroyan inputs making Artemisia smirk at the comment finding it a bit funny along with Hodgins, Angela's ex-soon-to-be-husband chuckling silently to himself.

"We're going to need the Jaws of Life to pry this guy out of here." He clears his throat and rubs his hands with excitement with his flashlight waving wildly. It was sad to see his excitement die with Brennan.

"It seems that any viable examination pre-extraction is impossible, unless somebody has X-ray vision." Daisy said in a joking manner laughing alone at her joke.

Even with the major headache Artemisia had, she focused on getting her work done. "The height of the nasal root points to a Caucasian." Artemisia said making sure that one of the interns was getting down the information.

"The large brow rid" Artemisia was going to continue but was quickly interrupted by their intern, Daisy. "The large brow ridge suggests a male." She said staring at Brennan with her work like she was waiting for a praise. Too sad for her that Brennan doesn't give out praise as much. "We need cause of death." There it goes, Brennan was not satisfied with her work just yet.

"What can be seen of the temporal, zygomatic, and frontal bones indicate that they're in multiple fragments, possibly from the crushing of the car." Daisy explains trying to find cause of death. Artemisia ignores everyone and does her own examination of the body and bones before her eye catches a familiar figure. She breaks away from the group not that they know she was gone and takes off her gloves disposing them in a bio-hazard waste bin.

"What's up? What did you find?" She asked holding out her hand for the file she had in her hand. "Nothing but loose ends. I don't know if you'll get anywhere with this information, Cherie." Artemisia doesn't listen to her, "It's better than nothing. Thank you, love." She said taking the file and heading to her office to set the file down. She opens a locked drawer and drop the files in there and locked it bringing the key with her. She headed back to the group and found that Angela had joined the rest of them.

"We shouldn't fear putting our hearts out there." Angela said taking Artemisia by surprise because it wasn't something that Angela would ever say. "Sweets?" Hodgins says his name like it's unbelievable.

"That's so beautiful." Daisy said unashamed that she was listening in on their conversation. "And so, inappropriate over a decomposing body." Artemisia cuts in seeing the look on their boss's face trying to warn them.

"Booth found out who delivered the car to the junkyard for crushing." Brennan informs the group as she walks by in a hurry before disappearing once again.

It was in the late afternoon after Artemisia was coming back from her lunch break with Sweets and an apple still in hand watching as Hodgins gets ready to cut the car in half only for that attention to be brought to Caroline and many people behind her. "Ah, ah, ah, ah, ah. Sorry. Cheri. Apparently, this is an historic piece of art." She informs the group and Hodgins has a huge disappointment display on his face. He was really looking forward to cutting the car in half.

"It's a hard car shell with a gooey corpse filling." Hodgins argues finding no art in such a piece of junk.

"I've already collected textile, tissue and bone samples." Daisy says with a bubbly character.

"There was no need of that since I had already done that but hey, I guess you're just doing extra work." Artemisia informs her as she walks closer to the group.

"That was before I got here. Here on in, this is an historic piece of art. These fine people persuaded a judge of that and got a temporary injunction." Caroline said walking around the piece of junk.

"It's a crime scene." Artemisia exclaimed. "Not until proven." Artemisia shakes her head and heads to her office. "Oh, this suck." She hears Hodgins whine before closing the door to her office.

Artemisia sat in her chair with a folder covering her head as she laid back trying to relax and ignoring the itching feeling she had to dig up that file and re-read all the facts all over again. She did it anyways, that locker drawer became unlocked and that file was out once again. A Filipino-Mexican family killed in their own homes.

Artemisia could remember to date and the big house with white fences and a bright red door. It gave such a homey feeling and warmth but now when she looks back all she could feel was death and the dirt that she had to dig out of.

 _"_ _Art! Come on! Mom and dad are waiting!" Shabina, her twin sister yelled from the bottom of the stairs. A 12-year-old Artemisia hurried and skip down the steps coming down, "I'm coming." She yelled racing out the door in her robot costume for Halloween._

 _The scene changed to a 13-year-old Artemisia trying to sneak out of the house only to be caught by her mother. "Where do you think, you're going Art?" Her mother sat on the couch facing the stairs. She turned on the lamp when Art reached the door. "Haha… Just checking if the door's lock mom. I'm going back to bed now." Artemisia ran back up the stairs and into her room and found Shabina giggling at her. "I told you, she would catch you. She always does." Shabina says giggling to herself. "You're so dead." Artemisia said jumping on the bed and tickling her._

 _Shots fired woke the entire house. It was late at night, 15-year-old Artemisia and Shabina both got up and could feel the movement in the house. Another shot was fired and a body dropped to the ground. "Art, I'm scared." Shabina said holding onto Artemisia. "It's okay." Artemisia said trying to comfort her sister but then two men barges into their room wearing face masks. One of each grab one another of the girls. "Take her." The man said pointing to Shabina. They grabbed her and took her out of the room. Artemisia could remember her sister crying for her to help her but Artemisia couldn't do anything. She kicked, punched and fought and fought and she still couldn't get freed._

 _They grabbed Artemisia and threw her into a big box containing her older sister and brother both dead. They throw a lid on top and started to bury them. Artemisia screamed for help and no one came, she was just using extra oxygen. She had to dig herself out of that grave and she did but she would never forget the fear she felt being buried all alone. When she did come out, she could remember the sunlight she felt burning on her skin and a shadow figure standing in front of her with a gun pointed at her head only she passed out and the next time she woke up she was in a hospital._


	2. Chapter 2

The Skull in the Sculpture Pt2

After making series of calls to multiple number all Art could come up with was nothing. All the calls made were blank. She was tired. A knock at the door scared her as she quickly closed the file and dropped it into the drawer slamming it shut as she turns towards the open door where Angela stood. "Angie, it's just you." Artemisia breathed out leaning back.

"Hey, Sweetie, you okay?" Angela asked softly resting her hand against Art's forehead to feel her temperature. Artemisia ignored her question, "You found something?"

"Yeah, Brennan wanted me to get you." Angela informs her. Artemisia nods her head taking in the information and trying to put her demon's bac in her locked box. "I'll be there in a minute." Artemisia breathed out again.

"Stop thinking about the past, sweetheart. It won't do you any good." Angela said to her.

"One day maybe I won't but for now I can't stop."

"Come on, let's go. Don't want to keep Brennan waiting Angie." Art said leaving the room unable to take any more talk and headed to Angela's work station/room.

"Okay, look at this. Here we have our car, right?" She showed on the screen the crashed car. "It had a low carbon steel frame with a yield strength of 22,450 psi. So, since I know the hydraulic crusher imparts 163 tons of force, first horizontally, then in a 32-degree curling motion, I was able to verify the source of every single ripple on the surface of the crushed bar, which then gave me the data to play the crushing backwards." Angie takes full control of her computer showing them the crashed car and the body.

Booth was amazed by what a computer could do, surprisingly. "Daisy provided me with the approximate tensile strength of each Geoffrey's bones, plugged in the bone fragments' final positions and base on those correlated each injury as the body was moved through the car as it was crushed." She explains showing before and after the car was crushed.

"God, I really hope that guy didn't know what was happening to him." Booth took pity on the victim.

"His bones sustained 88 fractures, all of which can be explained by the crushing in the car." Angie shows the body making it suicide.

"Suicide."

"Most likely, yeah." Angie agrees until they hear a buzzer go off and new information adds into the system showing new data that proves that it wasn't suicide.

"What's that?" Booth asks.

"Um… this run included the last of the data." Angie answers running the program again. "Oh, no." She whispers as the system up comes up again and shows that it wasn't suicide.

"What?"

"There's an 89th fracture." Art observed the cut in the skull that is highlighted.

"The fracture there on his occipital…" Brennan says finishing her sentence. "It was not caused by the car being crushed."

"What caused it?" Booth asks.

"I need to examine the skull." Brennan answers him.

"It wasn't supposed to be this way. I wanted to prove it wasn't murder." Angie said disappointed.

"But it is. The 89th fracture proves that Geoffrey Thorn was murdered." Artemisia states.

"I'll call Caroline." Booth says taking out his cell.

Hodgins holds the Jaws-of-Life cutting into the piece of art while Cam, Daisy, Brennan and Art stand off to the stand observing as he tears the sculpture apart.

"I'm going in!" Hodgins warns excitedly as he peels back enough of the car to reveal the skull.

"Careful." Brennan warns as Hodgins rips some cord out that block the skull. "Okay. Now, what we want to do here is remove the skull very carefully. Carefully." Brennan warns as Daisy goes to pull out the skull.

"Careful." Art warns her once again seeing the pressure she was putting on the skull that would shatter it. It was too late, it shatters into pieces in Daisy's hand and they stare in horror.

"I can't believe you did that." Cam says in disbelief and shocked. Hodgins stifles a laugh and Art elbows him in the stomach making him groans.

"Bummer." He groans under his breath. Artemisia sighs in frustration about having to stay up and putting the skull back together.

"Usually, when you say 'we', you mean me." Daisy finally says after a pregnant silence in horror. "I'm sorry. I'll put it together. I will stay up all night." She apologizes.

"We got it cover." Brennan said trying to keep the annoyed tone out of her voice. "Well, I will assist you every step of the way. I will not leave your side." Daisy insist. "No need." Artemisia snap finally too annoyed with her and started to pick up the skull pieces as quickly and gently as she could.

Artemisia moved the bones to a different room and started and Brennan joined her later to help put the skull back together. They were almost finish when Angie walked into the room.

"Is that Geoffrey Thorne?" Art stands up and stretches cracking her back.

"Yes. Nearly done."

"I honestly didn't think it would be murder." Angie says trying to start out a conversation. Art stops stretching and looks at her friend in pity.

"Which makes your conclusions all the more credible." Brennan says not looking up from her work putting in the finishing touches.

"Only you would find that comforting." Angie says not knowing why she expected more from her friend again. "Booth is questioning DeLuca again. He seems to have a motive."

"So, there's still a chance that your friend is not a murderer." Brennan said giving Angie hope about her friend or so she thought. Artemisia gave a hopeful smile trying to encourage but with Brennan's words it wasn't helping.

"Yeah." Angie says not knowing what to say next even though she had more she wanted to say.

"We'll know more when we identify the murder weapon." Art tells her trying to help. "It wasn't Roxie." Angie defend her friend/lover.

"Do you still have feelings for her?" Brennan ask standing up done with the skull and putting her bone down.

"Booth tells me that sometimes people say the exact opposite of what they mean"

"I do still have feelings for her." Angie admits.

"Are you saying the opposite of what you mean now or before?" Brennan said confusingly making Artemisia giggle a little.

"We had a very intense relationship in college, and she fell in love with me-way in love with me. When I broke it off, she was really hurt." Angie signs and explains their relationship.

"That happens with you, I mean look at Hodgins." Art said and Brennan nodding her head agreeing with her.

"This was worse than Hodgins. This was, 'I'm gonna run away to Europe and stop being an artist' hurt." Angie disagrees shaking her head. A buzz in her pocket took her attention away from Angie. Art took off her gloves and grabbed her IPhone tucked in her pocket. "Oh." Was all she could say to Angie with her attention on the text message sent by a mysterious man.

"Is that Sweets?" She heard Angie ask her not really paying attention Artemisia answer the question without thinking.

"Yeah, he wants to go out for dinner later…" Artemisia pauses hearing what jut came out of her mouth. "Uh…" Artemisia turns to see Angie with her arms crossed together and Brennan standing with a confused expression.

"Are you seeing Sweets?" Brennan asks Artemisia.

"No, no, no. We aren't dating. We're occasionally hooking up." Artemisia explains to them.

"Are you exclusive?" Angie asks.

"Yes."

"Do you sleep over at his place and have dinner from time to time without the sex?"

"Yes." Artemisia nods her head.

"Do you go out to eat or play games or watch movies together?"

"Yes, we do. I don't know how any of this relates- "

"Then, yes you're dating him." Angie interrupts Artemisia in the middle of a sentence.

"We're not dating." Artemisia denies because they really aren't dating. "Based on the depth of the cut and the size length, we should be able to id the weapon to a common fire ax." Artemisia said switching the topic back to the case at hand. Brennan leaves the room to go confirm with Booth and Angie quickly follows, after giving Artemisia a knowing look saying that they are dating whether she know sit or not.

It was during lunch, in the same similar small diner and bar sat Sweets and Angela at one table talking about her feelings for Roxie and her 'insecurities' about putting herself in a vulnerable situation and protecting herself from love.

"It's exactly the same situation as the last time we were sitting here." Sweets tries to explain to her. "Except, you know, you're quieter."

"No, that was about Hodgins. This is about Roxie." Angela said trying to separate the two.

"You want to have sex with Roxie." Sweets said in a louder voice than intended surprise at her change of sexuality.

"What was that about quieter?"

"I'm sorry. I'm not certain that you're being guided by your brain. That's all. Need can be confused with love. Fantasy can convince us that what we're feeling is love/" Sweets said trying not to offend Angela in any way.

"So, you're saying that this is all rebound?" Angela sums up his calculation and Sweets nods agreeing with her with his assumption.

"No. You don't understand love, Sweets." Angela states forgetting about Artemisia and his possibly relationship.

"I'm not as innocent as you might think." Sweets defends himself making Angela think back to her earlier conversation with Artemisia.

"You have this bourgeois notion that for love to be real, it has to be permanent so I don't understand your relationship with Artemisia if you're just friends with benefit or more? Because nothing is permanent. We move in and out of loving people but that doesn't make the love any less real." Angie explains.

"Wait-what relationship with Art? There is no relationship, we just hook up from time to time because we don't have anyone yet." Sweets explains to Angie.

"You go out to dinner, movies, she sleeps over at your place and you hang out without the casual sex sometimes. What type of relationship would you call that if not a relationship?" Angie questions him. They were going off topic but it couldn't be helped. Angie wanted to know what was going on in this so called no relationship with Art and she wasn't going to let her friend be hurt.

"She's my friend. Of course, we go out." Sweets said not having much to defend himself because he, himself doesn't even know.

"So, no romantic feelings towards her. You just hook up from time to time or have dinner without the casual sex and fall asleep next to each other?" Angela asks not knowing what they really do in their free time but she could fill in the pieces because Sweets isn't a guy who would just hit home run and ask her to leave.

"No. None. She's my friend. We have lots in common and tend to find each other interesting and comfortable to be around, that's all. Plus, I might be interested in someone else already." Sweets said not denying the possible nights that Art would sleep over without them having casual sex.

"You do? Who -" Angie started to try and ask more questions but sadly Sweets wouldn't let her.

"Nothing about me and her. We are here to talk about you. This notion you have of me being bourgeois abut love – maybe it's just because you haven't found the love of your life." Sweets said continuing from his early statement before they were off track.

"I have, actually – many times." Angie defends wanting to go back to talking about this possibly girl Sweets is interested in because she knows her friend and Art has romantic feeling for the man sitting before her whether she knows it or not.

"Fine. It seems to me that you always leave yourself an escape hatch in your relationships because you're afraid of commitment."

"Nice try, but no." Angie said taking another sip. "Actually, I commit to every person I love."

"You marry a man, and then conveniently forget that you married him because you got zonked on kava, kava? That compromises your relationship with Hodgins, so that ends along with the marriage. Now you say you have these intense feeling for an ex-over whose heart you're already broken. Don't you see the potential disaster here?" Sweets said trying to explain and going all shrink on her with his words almost convincing her of not trying to hook up with her ex.

"Look, you said that without the possibility of pain there can be no joy, no real love."

"I said that? That's beautiful." Sweets said surprised at his own words.

"Look, I don't want to hurt Roxie again."

"Then don't. Don't. Put her welfare first. Let Roxie decide if she's ready to pursue this relationship."

"Okay." Angie nods agreeing with Sweet yet the hopes in her died at the fact that Roxie won't want a relationship. "And what if she doesn't?"

"Then I'm afraid you'll have to live with that pain." Sweets finish and they end lunch silently thinking their own thoughts. Angie thinking about the possibly relationship with Roxie starting again forgetting about Sweets and Art's possibly relationship coming to an end. Sweets thinking about a familiar intern and a familiar hazelnut haired color girl and how to go about the problem in his head. The conversation with Angela brought questions to his head also about their relationship if it was okay for him to just go ahead and ask the girl he's interested in on a date because their relationship isn't real so it should be okay, right? Those brown eyes staring back at him letting him see the feelings she felt for him, he pushes to the back of his mind convincing himself that she didn't feel that way and so he shouldn't feel guilty about what's to come.


	3. Chapter 3

The Bones That Blew Pt1

"I haven't been avoiding you, Sweets. I've just been really busy" Art said in an irritated tone examining the remains in front of her on the table top not turning to look at him, not even for a second because she knew she wouldn't be able to hide the pain behind her eyes if he asked her the right question.

"You've been looking at the same bone the entire time I've been here." A frustrated sigh escape her lips. Art lowered her hand and rest them on the table.

"What do you want from me?" Art asked Sweets bracing herself before turning to face Sweets without the bone in hand.

"I want to know how my friend is doing. Why you're avoiding me and don't tell me you've been busy." Sweets exclaim silencing her when she tried to tell him again that she was busy.

Art tried to hide the pain she felt as she remembered the night she realized that she may have had more than just friend feelings for him.

 _Art was working and looking over the old file she had gotten from Caroline and other evidence that she's kept over the years. Her hand went to grab her cup of coffee only to find it empty. Art sighed and yawned pulling her arms back and stretching them out. She grabbed her cup and headed up to the balcony area where everyone was gathered. Hodgins, Cam, Booth and Brennan were all up there looking over the platform._

" _What are you guys doing?" Art asked walking towards them after getting her another cup of coffee._

" _Sweets is firing Daisy for us." Hodgins explains grabbing her attention from stirring her cup of coffee to the forensic platform where Sweets and Daisy were engaged in a conversation._

" _We're wondering what his method will be." Cam says and Art just takes a sip of her newly brewed coffee cup not interested in what they were doing at all._

" _He'll explain to her logically." Brennan tells them like she expected him to do it that way. "that this environment is not conductive for either her or us and, as a scientist, she'll realize that he's right."_

" _No, Sweets is a lot sneakier than that. He'll use some kind of psychological Jedi mind trick to make her think it was her idea to quit." Booth argues with Brennan. Art listens to their conversation and turns around to pour herself some more coffee as she finishes her newly brew cup of coffee._

" _I'm totally shocked." Hodgins says from behind her as she turns back around with her cup in hand and her grip falters. The hot liquid burned her skin making her yelp out in pain as she tries to brush away the hot liquid from her hand. Ignoring the scene before her eyes she turns to grab a bunch of napkins cleaning the mess she made and dabbing the hot liquid from her hand._

" _Woah, Art! Are you okay?" Hodgins and Cam come to her side and help her wipe the hot liquid from her hand. Art could feel his gaze on her back but she couldn't turn to look at him. She just couldn't instead she focus on cleaning the mess she made._

"Look, I'm sorry that you think I've been avoiding you but I haven't okay. I've been busy. Sorry if I can't make time for you like I did before but I mean you got yourself a girlfriend. Go hang with her because unlike Daisy, I have a job I need to get done. Now if you're done here, please leave so I can work, Sweets." Artemisia said not meaning to sound like a bitch but she couldn't help the bitterness filing her chest. She turns back to her bones getting new gloves and started to work ignoring Sweets and not knowing when he had left or if he had, she didn't care.

Max, Brennan's father enters the room over hearing the conversation between Sweets and Art and he couldn't help himself because he owed her family big time whether she knows it or not and that's why he can't leave her be.

"Look -" Art starts to say but stops in the middle of her sentence seeing that the figure by the doorway isn't the person she expected but Max Keenan who leaned against the doorway with his arms crossed.

"Can I help you?" Art asks him unsure of what he was doing there in the first place. His presence scared her, he intimated her yet somehow there was a little of her that felt a tiny bit of safety with him. She had no idea where that feeling came from because she couldn't remember her childhood so it's hard to say whether she met him or not.

"I can see it." He says making Artemisia raise her eyebrow giving him an expression saying that she didn't understand what he meant by those words. "You love him."

"He's just a friend and I don't see how that's any of your business." Artemisia says turning back to the table of skeletons and getting to work once again.

"Come on." Max nods his head for Artemisia to follow him and it was then that Art realized that he was wearing a white coat. Art followed him into a room full of kids who were waiting with similar white coats.

"Alright, pass these around kids." Max said handing goggles to each kid around the experiment. "And this is a co-worker of my daughter. Her name is Art." Max introduce her to the kids.

"Okay, everybody put on your goggles." Max instructed as he started the experiment and Brennan walks into the room greeting mostly her father and Art waves a little to her otherwise he goes back to the kids and starts the experiment.

"Ready, aim, fire." Max says starting the experiment and a red beam laser shoots out at the circular red circle connecting the lines together creating some sort of shape that the kids seem to be so fascinated about.

"The light refracted!" An exciting kid yells out

"Yeah, now why is the light visible?"

"Because the Jell-O molecules are close together." A different kid answers his question.

"Yeah. But that's not magic. That's - "

"Max K. The science way." The kids yell together excitingly and Art could see why the kids love him.

"Science Squad, meet my daughter the world-famous anthropologist, Dr. Temperance Brennan." Max introduces Brennan whose standing in the doorway. "Of course, I taught her everything she knows." Max bragged.

"Uh, actually. I went to college." Brennan interrupted. "I have multiple degrees."

"Well, tell the kids a little something about refraction."

"Snell's Law states that the angle of incidence is related to the angle of refraction where "V" equals the wave velocities through the respective media - And "N" equals - "

"Nifty. That's very nifty. But what was your favorite example when you were a kid?" Max interrupts her.

"Rainbows." Brennan answers thinking back to when her family was still together and her father would help make science more fun for her. He's the reason she's come to love science.

A buzz in Art's pocket turns her attention away from the warmth of Brennan and her father. Booth sent a text to Art asking for Brennan because there's a case and he's outside waiting for her. Brennan walks out before Artemisia could catch her. Art says her goodbye to the kids and Max before running out to prepare knowing that Brennan and Cam would want her out at the scene also.

Art was in her office getting her bag ready and a shadow moved behind her coming closer with what look like to be a knife pointing at her. Art grabbed the hand that tapped on her shoulder and twist their arm kicking their knee bringing them down.

"Artemisia! Art! It's just me." Wendell said in pain. He had a thin sharp pencil in his hand that explained the knife that she saw in the shadow.

"I'm sorry Wendell. Reflexes." Artemisia said letting go of his arm helping him back onto his feet.

"You ready? We're all set to go." Wendell said rubbing the shoulder that was twist.

Artemisia arrived on the scene before Brennan no idea how she made it before Brennan but was thankful because Brennan may be her friend but she is also her boss. She ordered the other interns and forensic team to take photos of the surrounding and samples of dirt, etc.

Brennan and Booth both arrived right when Art was currently retrieving parts of the skull from the tree. "Most likely a wind deposited it here." Art said looking around in the tree branches seeing no possibly way a part of the skull could have made it onto the tree.

"That seems most likely." Booth states like it's obvious and startles Art a little but letting her know that they have arrived.

"Well, the bones didn't come from the ground, and they didn't come from the sky, that leaves the wind." Brennan explains liking that she has a theory and evidences to support her theory. Art steps down and sets the pieces of the skull carefully down on the tray letting Brennan see the skull more carefully.

"Found a hyoid." Wendell's voice echoes throughout the surrounding area. Art gives her task to another intern and heads over to the group.

"Oh, he found a hyoid." Booth says in the familiar tone that he didn't understand the language or words that were spoke.

"Dead guy's hyoid."

"Guy as in sexually non-specific urban colloquialism, or in reference to the gender normally associated with penis, Mr. Wendell?" Brennan takes the hyoid or penis as she calls it.

"Uh…the penis?" Wendell says unsure.

"Similar char marks."

"The body of the hyoid is fractured." Art says as she exams the bones.

"Strangulation?" Wendell suggests.

"This man was murdered, we'll need to search this entire area." Brennan pronounce looking at Booth.

The forensic team stayed back to search the area and continue collecting sample and Art stayed with them. Ever since that day she's been volunteering to help whatever she can to keep herself busy. After they finished, Wendell drove them back to the Jerrersonian. The door to her side open but Art didn't realize that it was open. Her mind was currently wandering millions of things.

"Art? Hello? Art!" Wendell yelled making Art jumped at the sound of his voice and hit her head on the open metal door of her side.

"Oww. Shit." Art touched her head and realize that it was bleeding.

"I'm sorry, I didn't - "Wendell panics slightly surprised at her use of language never hearing Art curse before and the bleeding of her head.

"Can you get the first aid kit?" Wendell grabs the first aid kit in the draw right in front of where Art's sitting. He slides his hand across my covered clothed thigh before he lays the first aid kit there. He looks near the injury wound and Art could feel the warmth of his breathe on her face. He grabs a cotton ball and some alcohol to clean the injury before bandaging it up. The warmth of his hand was something that Artemisia hasn't felt in a long time. The gentleness that he treated her with as he patches her up from the injury touches her heart because not many people does that for her anymore nor does she let just anyone touch her.

Art knew that even if Wendell was interested in her it would be too soon for her to move onto another person right away. The feelings she has for Sweets didn't just died, she just locks them away so it wouldn't resurface ever again. Any feelings like that, she probably would never want to put herself in that situation again and she wouldn't do that to herself.

His eyes drop down to her lips as she bits them, slowly he leans in. Their lips only an inch away from one another and soon as their lips were about to touch Cam appears walking toward the car.

"You got the remains and samples we needed?" When Cam appeared the two were super far apart. Wendell was all the way near the back of the car and Art was just sitting in her seat with the first aid kit in her lap facing the front. What almost happen had Art smiling, the feeling she got was like she was back in high school. It was a new feeling she haven't felt in a long time.

"What are you all smiley about? What happen?!" Cam asked as she approached the car seeing the newly injured on her face.

"Nothing." Art shook her head and quickly helped them get the remains inside. Art quickly escapes to her office after helping them bring the remains inside needing to take a breather.

Her door was slightly ajar but she didn't notice that. Art set her jacket on her chair and reached over to turn on her lamp. She didn't notice the unfriendly enemy behind her. Before she knew it, she was slammed down onto her desk. She couldn't move, the attacker stabbed her slightly below her stomach as she turn missing her slightly yet still cutting her. Jerking to get her hands free, Art grabbed a pen from her cup of utensils and aim at her attacker. Knowing she got her attacker when she heard their scream in pain.

Art pushed her attack off her trying to run to the door but her attacker caught her leg tripping her in the process as she fell to the ground. Art yelped as she fell to the ground in a hard impact. Her attacker tried to attack her on top of her only for Art to kick him off her. She crawled towards the door but was being dragged backwards. "Help!" Art yelled out. She kicks the knife out of their hand and swings her leg back to kick their face away from her. She's grabbed once again slamming her hard on the ground face down. The attackers get on her back and slams her head once more onto the ground.

"You don't know when to stop looking do you?" Her attackers said in a threatening manner pulling her hair and slamming her back onto the ground.

"You're here because I'm getting closer aren't I? There is no way in hell I will stop. I will find you and I will kill you myself." Artemisia spat out letting out a scream when they tighten their grip and slam her head back down.

The sounds of running footstep could be heard from her office. Her attacker quickly slams her head down once more before running out the door. Her attacker runs into Booth who reached the door first. They push Booth out of the way and grabbed the first person they see which happens to be Angela who was running behind Booth. He grabbed her and held her at neck point dragging her away. Security was coming from all directions the only way he could escape was up and that's exactly where her attacker went.

"No!" Art screams as she sees who the hostage is. She runs to the front of the group. "Let her go." Art said being held back by Booth who had his gun out pointing at the attacker. "Put the gun down Booth!" Art yells at Booth pushing his gun down to the floor as the attacker forces the knife into her neck more not yet drawing blood but enough to scare them.

The attacker breaks the window behind them ready to jump out from the chaos. "No. Stop, please." Art finds herself begging knowing that they were trying to take out Angela as a sign for her to stop.

"No!" Art jumps toward the window at the exact same time the attacker jumps out trying to drag Angela with them. Art's hand connected with Angie pulling her away from the attacker hand trading places through the window.

"Woah" Booth says as he grabs her arm yanking it to hold her up from falling. As Art hang on the window with Booth holding her up multiple hands grabbed her arm helping Booth pull her up. Art slouch against the wall breathing heavily and groaning as Angie and Brennan both hugged her.

"Ow." Art said as they hug her too tightly. "I think you popped my shoulder Booth." Art held her arm as the pain wouldn't fade away.

"Here - "Booth touches her arm and she flinches from the pain in her arm. "I'll just pop it back in." He said. "Oh three."

"One" Art braces herself and screams as Booth pops it right in after one. "What the fuck- What happen to two and three?"

"Two, three." Booth said getting back up.

"You're fucking kidding me." Art mutters getting help from Angie and Brennan to stand up.

"Come on, sweetie, let's get you fix up." Angie help fix Artemisia up bandaging her bleeding wounds. "Sweetie, you look a mess." Angie said as she took in all her wounds, one on her forehead from earlier along with bruises from being slammed onto the ground and one on her left side and small wounds from the knife on her arm.

"Thanks." Art said sarcastically leaving the room and going back to her office. She took her time and when she arrived everything was back in order. It seems like what just happened didn't just happen.

"Hey, I heard you got attack and uh- wanted to see if you were okay." Max who fixed up her office for her sat on the couch in the middle of her office room surprising her. "Wow you look like shit." He commented making Art smile at his use of wording.

"Tell you what? Why don't you come out to lunch with Tempe and I? We're going to the diner. I heard you loved that place." A grateful smile landed on her lips. "Thanks, but I think I'm just gonna do some paper work and then go home." Art said not wanting to intrude on their father and daughter bonding.

Art spent her time just doing paper work not realizing that the time had gotten so late.

"I brought Chinese." Wendell came knocking at her door with Chinese food in hand surprising her.

"What?" Wendell closed the door behind him and made himself at home on her couch.

"Come on" Wendell waves her over to the couch in the middle of the office and place the food on her coffee table. Art is forced to join him putting down her work.

They spent the rest of the night talking and joking with one another. Somehow Art started to open up more to him as he her. And the next, Wendell connected his lips with her surprising her.

"I'm sorry. Was that- uh. I'm sorry." Wendell stuttered as Art pulled away from him. Art smile and put him back into a kiss. This kiss sent tingles down her toes. It was warm and just right for her. His smile and gestures warmed her heart. His tongue swept her lips and she open for him letting their tongue battle one another. They have an intense make-out before they are rudely interrupted by Joe their night security guard.


End file.
